Telengana government to bring new rules to ensure presence of doctors in public hospitals

Hyderabad, October, 2015

The Telangana State government is expected to bring in new reforms to regulate government doctors in the state. These reforms are aimed at stopping the government doctors from practicing in private clinics and improving healthcare facilities in the government hospitals in the state. As a step to improve healthcare in the Government hospitals, the state government wants to put a check to the increased absenteeism by the doctors in the first place. As part of this, the Government is planning to introduce biometric attendance system at all government hospitals and also planning to bring in new regulations to contain government doctors working in private clinics. 

There have been many instances observed at leading hospitals in Hyderabad and even in the district and regional community healthcare centres, where the doctors just visit the hospital for just half an hour or an hour and check a few patients and go away or sometimes never turn up for the whole day. A similar trend was observed at ‘Nilofer Children’s hospital in Hyderabad a few months back, where out of 15 doctors, except one, no one turned up the entire day and patients are either forced to go away to other private hospitals or wait for the next day till the doctors come to their rescue. When asked about the doctor’s absence, the reply from the authorities is that the doctors have left for the day or they will come next day. “In government hospitals we are at the doctor’s mercy. Almost 90-95 per cent of government doctors are having their own private clinics or working in some other private hospitals to earn extra bucks. The doctors profession has become a highly commercial one and no doctor works for the noble cause or for any charities these days,” says a patient at NIMS.

Going by this, one can imagine the situation at the district or regional healthcare centres. Two months ago, a one week old infant baby boy kept in the intensive care unit (ICU) at district government hospital in Guntur in Andhra Pradesh was killed due to rat bites and no doctors or nurses were available to take care of the baby in the emergency. 

This trend is not only in Andhra Pradesh but in almost all the government hospitals in Telangana also. The main reason for this is absenteeism of the doctors and nurses. Because of this situation, the condition of all the government hospitals has become pathetic and poor patients are forced to visit private clinics spending thousands of rupees. “We have all facilities in the government hospitals except the availability of doctors and nurses. In some hospitals, though all doctors posts are filled, the doctors never visit the hospitals on time, whereas in a few others, only the compounders and nurses manage the show as the doctor’s posts are left vacant for years and never filled,” said a practising junior doctor at Osmania Hospital. 
In view of this, the Telangana state government wants to bring in strict regulatory reforms to check the doctors presence in the government hospitals. As part of this, it is also planning to introduce biometric attendance records which will record the ‘in and out’ timings of the doctors thus wanting to ensure better healthcare to the people.